Disable commandButton after first click to prevent double submission

Question

I have an apex:commandButton on a visualforce page that invokes a method on the controller. There is currently no rerender value set for the button. Instead the controller method returns a PageReference to redirect the user as required.

E.g.

Visualforce:

<apex:commandButton value="Save" action="{!save}"/>

Controller:

public PageReference save() {
    // save body ...

    // return the user the a parent opportunity
    return new PageReference('/' + opp.Id);
}

Users are currently able to click on the resulting save button multiple times before the controller completes and returns the PageReference to redirect the browser to an opportunity.

How can I disable the commandButton after the first click?

---

I tried wrapping the commandButton in an actionStatus and facet, but the need to define the rerender property prevented the resulting PageReference redirect.

E.g.

This will render nicely in the browser and prevent multiple clicks, but doesn't redirect to the Opportunity on completion.

<apex:actionStatus id="saveStatus">
    <apex:facet name="stop">
        <apex:commandButton value="Save" action="{!save}" status="saveStatus" rerender="saveParentBlock" />
    </apex:facet>
    <apex:facet name="start">
        <apex:commandButton value="Saving..." disabled="true" status="saveStatus"/>
    </apex:facet>
</apex:actionStatus>

---

There is a similar question Using jQuery to disable VF page button onclick. I need to support an existing PageReference redirect, which slightly alters the requirements.

Force.com Discussion Boards: Disabling a commandButton to prevent double submission

Ideas: Disable command buttons on click in visualforce as standard

Answer 1

The mechanism I have found to be most maintainable uses a JavaScript function called by an element's click event, which internally calls an actionFunction to post the form, disables the buttons on the page and then returns false on the commandlink/button. This is used in conjunction with an oncomplete on the actionFunction to re-enable the buttons when the form has been (ajax) posted and returns a result to the page.

Without the rerender attribute the form performs a full postback along with the disabling of the buttons.

Note: You can't disable the button(s) before the form is posted or the data sent to the controller will not include which button/link within the form was clicked and thus which action to execute.

<script src="//ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/latest/jquery.js"></script>
<script>

    function buttonsEnabled(enabled) {
        // retrieve all of the buttons or links on the page
        // with the css class of btn
        var $buttons = jQuery('.btn');
        if (enabled === false) {
            // add the btnDisabled class to give it the look of being disabled
            // add the disabled attribute to actually disable interactability
            $buttons.toggleClass('btnDisabled', true).attr('disabled', 'disabled');
        } else {
            // remove the css class and the disabled attribute
            $buttons.toggleClass('btnDisabled', false).attr('disabled', null);
        } 
    }

    function doSomeWork() {
        // first, call the action function to post the form
        doSomeWorkActionFunction();

        // second, disable the buttons
        buttonsEnabled(false);

        // third, return false to prevent the click from
        // posting the form a second time
        return false;
    }

</script>

<apex:form>

    <apex:actionFunction name="doSomeWorkActionFunction" 
        action="{!yourControllerMethod}" 
        oncomplete="buttonsEnabled(true);"
        rerender="whateverYouNeedToRerender"></apex:actionFunction>

    <apex:commandLink action="{!yourControllerMethod}" 
        value="Your Text Here" 
        id="theCommandLink" 
        onclick="return doSomeWork();" />

</apex:form>

Answer 2

This seems to work:

<apex:commandButton value="Save" onclick="this.onclick=function(){return false;}" action="{!SaveAll}"  />

It appears that the first time through, the event listeners fire before the onclick gets replaced by the "do nothing" function. So I can press the button as often as I want but only the first press counts. None of the actionfunction / rerender things worked for my whole page submit, but this does, and it's simple.

Answer 3

This is one possible solution, I'm still keen to see if there is a better way of doing this, such as getting the actionStatus and facet to work with a PageReference redirect.

---

If the commandButton onclick event is used to immediately disable the button the post back to the controller method won't occur.

This won't work:

<apex:commandButton id="save" value="Save" action="{!save}" 
     onclick="this.disabled='disabled';return true;" />

Instead, create a JavaScript function that will disable the button after a short timeout via the commandButtons onclick event. You could inline this all into the onclick as required. I found it easier to split the functions out so I could disable other related buttons, etc.

<script>
    function disableOnSubmit(input) {
        setTimeout('disableAfterTimeout(\'' + input.id + '\');', 50);
    }
    function disableAfterTimeout(id) {
        var toDisable = document.getElementById( id );
        toDisable.disabled = 'disabled';
        // Use the Salesforce CSS style to make the button appear disabled
        toDisable.className = 'btnDisabled';
        toDisable.value = "Saving..."
    }
</script>

<apex:commandButton id="save" value="Save" action="{!save}" onclick="disableOnSubmit(this);" />

Answer 4

You can use action statuses to accomplish this without javascript

<apex:actionStatus id="mySaveStatus1">
    <apex:facet name="stop">
        <apex:commandButton value="Save Mappings" action="{!save}" rerender="dummy" status="mySaveStatus1"/>
    </apex:facet>
    <apex:facet name="start">
        <apex:commandButton value="Processing..." status="mySaveStatus1" disabled="true"/>
    </apex:facet>
</apex:actionStatus>

Not my idea, found it here via https://tquilamockingbird.wordpress.com/2011/11/10/salesforce-actionstatus-with-disabled-button-and-processing-image-100-on-platform/

Answer 5

Took @Daniel Ballinger solution and improved upon it a bit. For one, his version required that the button be given an Id. This uses a closure instead of selecting by the Id.

<script>
        function disableOnSubmit(input) {
            var btn = input;
            setTimeout(function(){ 
                btn.disabled = 'disabled';
                // Use the Salesforce CSS style to make the button appear disabled
                btn.className = 'btnDisabled';
                btn.value = "Saving..."; 
            }, 50);
        }
</script>    
<apex:commandButton value="Save" action="{!save}" onclick="disableOnSubmit(this);" />

Answer 6

Try commandButton with actionFunction:

<commandButton onclick="disableMe" oncomplete="runActionJS();"/>
<actionFunction name="runActionJS" action"{!action}"/>

Answer 7

This is my approach of how to disable commandButton until first click is processed and re-enable after first click results are returned from controller to page.

<apex:page>
    <script>
        var defaultEventListenerForSubmitBtn;
    </script>
    <apex:outputPanel id="op-panel">
    </apex:outputPanel>
    <apex:commandButton value="Submit" 
                        action="{!controllerActionMethod}" 
                        rerender="op-panel"  
                        onclick="this.value='Processing..';defaultEventListenerForSubmitBtn = this.onclick;this.onclick=function(){this.value='Processing..';return false;}" 
                        oncomplete="this.onclick = defaultEventListenerForSubmitBtn;this.value='Submit';"/>
</apex:page>

Answer 8

I was too behind this scenario to stop calling the action multiple times. This is what i've done. Maybe it will be useful.

Below is the command button.

<apex:commandButton value="Save" action="{!SaveForm}" id="csSave" onClick="return ValidatePage();"  />

When i click on the save buton at once the JS validation function ValidatePage() is called. In this i rename the value of the submit button as "Saving..." by the code

document.getElementById("FormPage:Form:FormBlock:csButtons:csSave").value = "Saving...";

And at the very first line of the Valaidation() function i put the following

var csSaveStatus = document.getElementById("LFormPage:Form:FormBlock:csButtons:csSave").value;
    if(csSaveStatus == "Saving...")
    {
        //alert("Save in progress.");
        return false;
    }

This will always return false silently and action is prevented to call multiple times. Additionally for the "disabled button" feel i just changed the button class name.

var btn1 = document.querySelector("[id$='csSave']");
btn1.className = 'btn btnDisabled';

Here is my JS validation function altogether.

function ValidateLoyaltyCase() {

var csSaveStatus = document.getElementById("FormPage:Form:FormBlock:csButtons:csSave").value;
if (csSaveStatus == "Saving...") {
    //alert("Save in progress.");
    return false;
}

document.getElementById("FormPage:Form:FormBlock:csButtons:csSave").value = "Saving...";
var btn1 = document.querySelector("[id$='csSave']");
btn1.className = 'btn btnDisabled';

}

Answer 9

I prefer just hiding the button (rather than disabling it) and displaying an animated "waiting" gif when the button is clicked. It still allows the form to process properly and gives the user a little more feedback.

This assumes you have a resource called "WaitingGif" (mine is a spinny little animated gif):

<apex:pageBlockButtons >
    <div class="waitingGifDiv" >
        <apex:image id="WaitingGif" value="{!URLFOR($Resource.WaitingGif)}" width="50" height="50" style="float:center-right; "/>
    </div>
    <div class="SubmitButtonDiv">
        <apex:commandButton id="SubmitButton" styleClass="SubmitButton" value="Submit Case" action="{!submitCase}" />
    </div>
</apex:pageBlockButtons>

Then you'll need just a little javascript (in this case with a little jquery help) to first hide the animated gif when the page loads. Then when the user clicks the button, hide the button and unhide the animated gif.

 <script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.1.3/jquery.min.js"></script>
<script >

    j$ = jQuery.noConflict();
    j$(document).ready(function() {
       //code when page is ready 
       j$('.waitingGifDiv').hide();

       j$('.SubmitButton').on('click',function() {
           j$('.waitingGifDiv').show();
           j$('.SubmitButtonDiv').hide();
        });
    });
</script>

Answer 10

Simplest of all. Just adding the onClick event handler and setting the disabled attribute to true solved my problem of repeated form submission and duplicate record creation.

<apex:commandButton value="Save" action="{!save}" onClick="this.disabled=true;"/>